15 year old Sian Spence is still coming down to earth having flown through her GCSE exam in Indoor Skydiving last week…

As part of her PE GCSE, Sian needed special permission from her teachers and the Welsh examination board – WJE, to be able to take the landmark flight.

Students are required to take 4 practical parts of their examination, including 1 ‘off site’. With a family as heavily involved in Skydiving as the Spences – it was no surprise that Sian opted for a freefall course when given the opportunity.

Attending Penglais School in Aberystwyth, the keen Skydiver has followed in the footsteps of her father Sandy, who not only met Sian’s mother in the Skydiving industry; he was a UK skydiving gold medallist and coach to the famous Red Devils display team. He proudly beamed: ‘she achieved 93%’ !
On top of that, Sian’s 83 year old grandmother celebrated her 80th birthday with a flight at the same wind tunnel!

With a family as fanatical about freefall flight as the Spences, it didn’t take Sian long to get into the sport – first trying indoor skydiving when she was 12. Speaking before her unusual examination, Sian said:

“I immediately loved it, but I hadn’t been for a couple of years because the indoor skydiving centres are too far away,”

The adrenaline inducing sport of Indoor Skydiving is loved up and down the country by anybody from skydive enthusiasts to first time experience tasters, as the 120mph winds and floating around as if you’ve just jumped out of a plane is a feeling that warrants the centre’s nickname: ‘The Smile Factory’. We think it’s great that the school complied and allowed this great addition to the curriculum – in fact, we’re pretty sure they should look at expanding into other great areas of the extreme sports world!

Good luck Sian, what are you going to do for your A levels… an actual Skydive? Synchronised Skydiving… or even a Base Jump?